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How I Doubled My Blog Traffic with Google and Social Analytics

As a certified girl boss or badass blogger, you need to know your audience inside and out in order to make sure your message resonates with them. By knowing WHO is reading your blog or buying from you, you can more easily target their demographic in the future. Chances are if 25-35 year old women who are into technology read your blog, then other 25-35 year old women into tech will be fans of your blog as well.

But, how do you know who your reader or buyer is? You’re not putting out a survey, “Hey! Tell me your intimate personal information!” No, you don’t want to do that, and you don’t have to. Your social media and website analytics already have that information. Through those analytics, you can know everything from how much money they make to their interests all the way to their favorite TV shows.

How can you use this? Mold your content around their interests. If your analytics show that your audience is into cooking and you’re a lifestyle blogger, post a few more recipe posts, create a recipes Pinterest board, Instagram your latest stellar dish. If your analytics show that your followers are mostly 45-65, maybe Instagram isn’t the best place to spend your time marketing (18-35 year olds favor Instagram). Your analytics can help you make major decisions about where and how to market your business.

Google Analytics

Google Analytics provides privacy for people logged into a Google service, so you only get a small percentage of your website reader’s demographic information. BUT, something is better than nothing and it provides some information that the other analytics platforms do not provide.

You can find out your reader’s ages, gender, location, and interests from Google Analytics. From my analytics, I know the majority of my readers are 25-34. How does this help me? You can use the average demographics for social media platforms to determine which ones make sense for your audience. There’s no use in using Twitter constantly if your audience isn’t interested in it.

Another useful bit of information: check the times of the day that you get the most traffic. It would be beneficial to post your blog about 30 minutes before the first peak. If your blog is associated with a blog feeder like Feedly or Bloglovin, your post will be added to their feed just before your audience is most likely to go to your site.

To see what your most popular acquisition source is (fancy way to say how people are finding your website), go to “Acquisition” and click overview. Here, you will find organic (search engine), direct, referral, and social traffic. This will help you to determine where to spend your promo time. Should you be wasting your time on Google Plus if you have only gotten one session of traffic from that source? Probably not. I was spending tons of time on StumbleUpon until I realized no one has ever found my site through StumbleUpon, why am I wasting my time? Are you getting a lot of referral traffic? From where? This bit-o-information will help you find out if your comments on other blogs or guest posts are bringing you any traffic.

Go to the “Behavior” tab to see what pages people are reading. What are your most popular posts? This can serve as a guideline for three things: 1) Topics you should write about more often 2) Posts you should update with new SEO, images, or resources 3) Posts that would be good to add an upgrade to boost your subscriber opt-ins.

Mama Says… TAKE ACTION

2) Go through your social media acquisition and choose which three social media platforms to focus on.

3) Focus entirely on those three social media platforms for the next month with the goal of driving more followers.

Twitter Analytics

Twitter Analytics provides the most information. The more followers you have, the more information they provide. Go to analytics.twitter.com and click the “Followers” tab. This is where you will find a wealth of information. You will learn everything from if your audience owns or rents their home to their shopping habits. From my analytics, I know my audience is mostly professional women interested in marketing, entrepreneurship, and technology. They make around $100k a year and prefer ethnic food. My audience is almost down the middle split between married and single. The vast majority owns their home rather than rents. Lastly, they prefer to buy online. What do I get out of this? Keep writing about marketing and business. Also, my audience has some money, so I have the ability to create high quality upgrades with an equivalent price.

Mama Says…. TAKE ACTION!

2) Come up with three action items for your blog or business to use this information.

Facebook Analytics

Go to your Facebook page analytics and click on people. Here, you will find ages, gender, and location. You can use this to compare to your other analytics. Is there a consistent theme of gender, age, and location across your site and social media platforms? This is your target demographic. Go to visits to find how people are finding you on Facebook. According to my external referrers, people are finding my Sarah Smirks page through my website, Google, and my email list most often. A helpful tool to track your Facebook page goals is to use Pages to Watch (under overview). You can compare your fan page to your competitors to see how you are comparing. If they are doing better, watch what they are doing, what time of day are they posting, and what types of posts they are posting. Last, look at your posts analytics under “overview.” What types of posts get the most reach and engagement? Use that information to help you come up with a proper Facebook page plan.

Mama Says…. TAKE ACTION!

1) Add three competitors’ pages to “Pages to Watch.”

2) In one week, check the comparisons. Use this to make a plan of action on the types of content you should be sharing and when.

Pinterest Analytics

Go to analytics.pinterest.com and then “Your Audience.” Here, you will find invaluable information about your audience. You have two tabs to choose from. Demographics will show you where your audience is located and general demographic information (who woulda thought?). From my analytics, I know the majority of my audience is from the United States, female, and speaks English. Once I click over to interests, I get the really great information. My audience is into Technology, gadgets, design, travel, photography, & art. What does that tell me? If I want more followers on Pinterest, I should probably start boards on these topics. It also gives me ideas for blog posts and new categories to write about. How awesome is this?! I can also see what businesses my audience engages with. For example, my audience is also interested in The Nectar Collective, ByRegina, Olyvia, The SITS Girls, Etsy, Wordpress, and Bloglovin.

Mama Says…. TAKE ACTION!

1) Go to analytics.pinterest.com and check what topics your audiences is most interested in.

2) Write 2-3 blog post ideas based on the interests that you learn.

3) Create one new board for your audiences interests.

Getting to know your audience on a deeper level will help you fine tune your messaging. If you want to boost traffic and increase your social media following, cater to your audience instead of your personal interests. By delving deep into your analytics, you can create a plan of attack that will help you create the perfect formula for blog or business growth. So, what are you waiting for? Take action!